Mark Rutte

Prime Minister Mark Rutte will attend this year's meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland this week. Finance Minister and Eurogroup President Jeroen Dijsselbloem, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation Lillianne Ploumen, and Minister for Health, Welfare and Sport Edith Schippers will also attend the forum in Davos.

Even after calls from King Willem-Alexander, Dutch citizen Ang Kiem Soei was executed at roughly 12:30 a.m. Sunday (local time) in Indonesia. Soei, from Utrecht but born in Papua, was killed by a firing squad.

January 27 marks the seventieth anniversary of the liberation of prisoners from the Nazi’s Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp and extermination facility. Dutch King Willem-Alexander, his wife, Queen Máxima and Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte will travel to Poland for a ceremony marking the anniversary, the government confirms in a statement.

The parliament is debating with Prime Minister Mark Rutte and several ministers on Wednesday about the terrorist attacks in Paris last week. The factions want to hear the Dutch government's views on the event and the readiness level to prevent and deal with such attacks in the Netherlands.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said it would be very strange if Greece chose to exit the eurozone, and dropped their policy measures meant to get the country’s finances in shape. Calling the proposition “bizarre,” he refused to speculate on a possible Grexit, saying only, “I assume that is not going to happen.”

The Netherlands is not at “war” with Islamist extremists, Prime Minister Mark Rutte said on Sunday. He disagrees with PVV leader Geert Wilders assertion that the entire Muslim world has declared war on the west, he said during television show Buitenhof.

Prime Minister Mark Rutte tried to allay fears that the Netherlands is not prepared to deal with domestic terrorism following a meeting of the Dutch Cabinet on Friday. “While we cannot guarantee that no attacks will take place, the police, security offices and the [National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism] have done everything reasonable to prevent this,” he said at a press conference.

Over 18,000 people showed up at Dam Square in Amsterdam to rally in support of free speech, and the victims of the shootings at Charlie Hebdo in Paris. “Today we say by the thousands, ‘Hands off our freedom,’” Prime Minister Mark Rutte firmly said.

Following an attack on the offices of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris, Prime Minister of the Netherlands Mark Rutte quickly notified the public that his country will support France as it deals with the fallout from the attack. Two armed, masked gunmen with rapid-fire weaponry and a rocket launcher initiated an assault on the office Wednesday leaving 12 dead, including two police officers, and at least nine injured.

New legislation that would put a restrictive cap on the amount of cash bankers may collect in bonuses missed its proposed January 1 start date when last minute questions were asked by senators of coalition leader VVD. The law was previously lauded by coalition partner PvdA, the Dutch labour party, which has been at odds with the VVD after a health care bill failed to pass a Senate vote.

Despite three Labour Senators saying they are still not prepared to vote in favour of a new legislative action that would limit the rights of medical patients, the prospect of a solution is apparently in sight. The crisis began Tuesday night when the three senators voted against health care legislation supported by the coalition government.

Nearly 90 people were arrested in Gouda yesterday for arguing over the presence of blackfaced Zwarte Piet characters at the city’s annual arrival of Sinterklaas celebration. Those taken into custody were a mix of protestors and Zwarte Piet supporters, police told broadcaster Omroep West.

The national memorial held in honour of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was viewed on television by 937,000 people, television ratings agency Kijkonderzoek said Tuesday. The memorial was held Monday afternoon in Amsterdam, and was attended by King Willem-Alexander, Queen Maxima and Princess Beatrix.

Flags across the Netherlands will be lowered to half-staff on Monday morning in advance of the country’s national memorial ceremony for the victims of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 later that afternoon. The commemoration at the RAI convention center in Amsterdam begins at 1 p.m., before Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte takes the stage to speak on behalf of the nation.

he country’s national memorial service for the victims of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 takes place at the RAI convention center in Amsterdam on Monday afternoon. Full details of the event can be found below.

Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte travelled to Australia Thursday after meeting with his Malaysian counterpart Najib Razak in Kuala Lumpur. He is meeting with Australian PM Tony Abbott. Discussions with both leading politicians are focused on the crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, which departed Amsterdam en route to Malaysia, but met with catastrophe in the skies over eastern Ukraine. Dutch casualties neared 200 in the July incident, and significant numbers of Malaysians and Australians were also on the flight that left 296 dead.

More human remains have been recovered at the crash site of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, which plummeted from the sky over eastern Ukraine in July. The remains were recovered by a team of Dutch investigators working with the State Emergency Service of Ukraine and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

Fighting against the advance of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria is akin to battling back the Germans during the second World War, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte told reporters Friday. “We must defend our core values tooth and nail if necessary,” he said after a meeting with the cabinet. “That was true then, and it is true now.”

In Amsterdam, thousands of people took part in an international effort to raise awareness for climate change. Sunday saw more than 150 countries take part in the Peoples Climate March, calling on the political leaders to make more effort to take better care of the planet, the NOS reports.

Today Prime Minister Mark Rutte had the chance to react to the Chamber's discussion yesterday. Regarding Wilders' anti Sharia declaration the Prime Minister said: "It s a negative statement, which judges people based on their religion and it is polarizing." Rutte said that Wilders also crossed the line when he talked about the Moroccan problem. "Such statements do not contribute to the solution and I want to say here that I want to live in a country where everyone wants to make a positive contribution and can have a safe home."

A Utrecht court is set to preside over an emergency hearing on Thursday afternoon over leaked budgetary figures. On Tuesday, RTL published prematurely disclosed figures about purchasing power which were scheduled to be publicly announced on Prinsjesdag.